Hundreds of thousands of people fled as last typhoon hits Philippines

A powerful typhoon destroyed homes, caused huge tidal waves and crossed the northern Philippines on Sunday, forcing hundreds of thousands of people to flee to emergency shelters in the sixth major storm to hit the country in less than a month.

Typhoon Man-yi slammed into the eastern island province of Catanduanes on Saturday night with sustained winds of up to 195 kilometers per hour and gusts of up to 240 kilometers per hour.

The country’s weather agency warned of a “potentially disastrous and life-threatening situation” in provinces along the route.

There was no loss of life from the typhoon, which is expected to blow northwestward on Sunday along the north of Luzon, the most populous region of the archipelago.

The capital area of ​​Metropolitan Manila would likely be spared from a direct attack, but it, along with surrounding areas, was placed under storm warnings and warned of dangerous coastal storm surges.

“The rain was very light, but the wind was very strong and made an eerie howling sound,” Roberto Monterola, a disaster mitigation officer in Catanduanes, told The Associated Press.

“The tidal waves rose more than seven meters (23 feet) along the main boulevard here, near the seaside houses. It looked really scary.”

He said the entire province of Catanduanes was left without power after the typhoon toppled trees and power poles, and disaster response teams were checking how many more homes were damaged in addition to those affected by previous storms.

“Apart from food, we need tin roofs and other construction materials. The villagers tell us that they are still recovering from the impact of the past storm and are stranded again by this typhoon,” Mr. Monterola said.

Almost half of the island state’s 80,000 people were housed in evacuation centres.

Catanduanes officials were so worried as the typhoon approached that they threatened vulnerable villagers with arrest if they did not comply with orders to evacuate to safer locations.

More than 750,000 people took shelter in emergency shelters, including churches and a shopping mall, due to Man-yi and two previous storms mostly in the northern Philippines, authorities said.

A rare series of back-to-back storms and typhoons to hit Luzon in just three weeks have killed more than 160 people, affected nine million people and inflicted such damage to settlements, infrastructure and farmland that the Philippines may have to import more. Rice is the staple food of most Filipinos.

President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., who held an emergency meeting as Man-yi approached, asked his Cabinet and state officials to prepare for a “worst-case scenario.”

At least 26 domestic airports and two international airports were temporarily closed, and inter-island ferry and cargo services were suspended as thousands of passengers and passengers were stranded by rough seas, according to a statement from the Philippine Civil Aviation Authority and coast guard.

The United States, Manila’s treaty ally, along with Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia and Brunei, provided cargo planes and other storm assistance to bolster the government’s disaster response agencies.

The first major storm, Trami, last month, killed scores of people after dumping one to two months of rain in just 24 hours in many towns.

The Philippines is hit by about 20 typhoons and storms every year. It is subject to frequent earthquakes and has more than a dozen active volcanoes, making it one of the most disaster-prone countries in the world.